


Merry and Bright

by mmeadowlarkk



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Era, Canon Universe, Christmas Decorations, Christmas Fluff, Established Relationship, F/M, On the Run, Post-Episode: s09e19-20 The Truth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:42:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28181850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mmeadowlarkk/pseuds/mmeadowlarkk
Summary: Mulder and Scully are on the run without a calendar, they might have lost track of time but they make it special their own way.
Relationships: Fox Mulder & Dana Scully, Fox Mulder/Dana Scully
Comments: 17
Kudos: 53
Collections: X-Files Secret Santa Fanfic Exchange (2020)





	Merry and Bright

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ATTHS_TWICE](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ATTHS_TWICE/gifts).



> Hi, 
> 
> This is for Crystal @ATTHS_TWICE , your prompt was: 
> 
> "How about a Christmas on the run? I like to think that as they run from place to place, staying here and there, they lose track of the dates. Obviously, they are aware when the seasons are changing, but they don't know the actual day. Holing up in a small cabin somewhere away from everyone, they have to be creative when it comes to celebrating the day, giving gifts, and making decorations. How will the day go for these two fugitives?"
> 
> I really hope you enjoy it! I tried to stay true to everything you pictured and fortunately Mulder made it easy for everything to connect. 
> 
> Special thanks to Jaime and Peyton for the beta, to Gin, and Freya for their support, and to Nicole for her sharp organization of this exchange! :) 
> 
> With my baby heart,  
> Merry Christmas!!

  
  


* * *

* * *

**Merry & Bright**

* * *

* * *

  
  
  


She never finishes her coffee. Mulder does. An obvious analogy, if you ask him. 

She doesn’t like anything in between. 

He learned this early on, back in those first 4am airport callings, he would get two cups of boiling hot coffee for them and after a few sips she’d abandon it. By the third or fourth time he noticed it, he wanted it to take it from her and gulp it down. Not much time went by and their partnership grew at impossible speed, they were friends and he started snatching the last of cup after cup of mediocre coffee on the road. Eventually, they became more than friends and he got to experience her elaborated morning routine that included those nice colombian beans she insisted on buying even now. Then too, he got the last drops from her mug. 

The one-sided love of his life, hot or cold. 

That’s how their relationship is too, her beliefs. It’s innate, the same way she can’t seem to be mildly beautiful, but has to take his breath away. 

He winces at the bitter taste, it sat a little too long. 

They’re not big on traditions, not conventional ones anyway. 

They were always everything but ordinary. 

The door slams shut loudly as she kicks it with one foot in those heavy winter boots they have to wear to salt the steps of the cabin. 

“Of all places, you had to choose the most dramatic.” She says with mocked annoyance. Her damp gloves fall next to the salt sack. 

“How is this dramatic if we're in the woods in the middle of nowhere?” He pretends he didn’t wake at dawn to three hours of shoveling snow away from the driveway, the porch and the steps. They have nowhere to go but he made it his work out. Her only job is to salt the steps and the porch. A morning routine for sport, it keeps them busy. 

He leans in to kiss her, she lets him. “A few more months here and there and we can… think of something.” He catches himself sounding like he’s making a promise. They have stayed loyal to focusing on the present. 

If not  _ one day at a time _ they take it one week at a time, and if they feel safe enough, two weeks at a time. Like this cabin, somewhere in Duluth, Minnesota, they’ve been here for a week but decided to stay for another one. The town isn’t that far and they’re still isolated enough that no one has driven by or looked their way. 

“Did you make more coffee?” she asks like she didn’t neglect her first one. Half of it, anyway. 

* * *

Workout. Breakfast. Shower. 

His days might merge together in a blur of nonsense but his morning schedule is sharp and it gives him a sense of stability. 

Not that he would lack stability as long as Dana Katherine Scully is around to anchor him to Earth and make sense of everything he doesn’t understand about their current lives. Even when he’s mostly or fully responsible for the events that led them here. The biggest mystery to him is how she actively chooses to stay beside him, in a figurative but a literal way too. 

“Ugh. It’s lukewarm.” Her complaint, a loud thought. 

He turns the water hotter and she jumps at the abrupt change of temperature. 

“Mulder!” She slaps his arm out of the shower. The sink is right next to it and it’s not his fault she frequently awakens his teasing nature. She puts her hands under the water first to gradually adjust to the burning hot spray and steps back into it. 

He tries to focus on his half shaven face when a splash hits him.

“Will you warm me up?” He turns to see Scully’s face in the middle of a cloud of steam, her cheeks are deliciously blushed, her complexion makes a contrast with the dark green of the curtain. 

He obeys and she takes his hand before he even walks into the shower. 

“Merry Christmas to me.” He meant it as a light-hearted expression, it was mainly about showing Scully how they might be hiding but the freedom of their intimacy always brings him joy. 

They both stand still, her hands clutch his waist and their smiles fade. No one asks questions and she shrugs off the tension by pulling him closer to her.

Was it Christmas already? 

His mind wanders off to what feels like not so long ago.

* * *

  
  


_ “Happy Thanksgiving.” The cashier smiles at him as he hands Mulder a paper bag full of vegetables and some more real groceries. They don’t do that often but fortunately for their health, Scully dictates most of their meals if she can help it, the more isolated the place they stay at, the better for her since it means cooking actual meals and not living off canned goods and greasy diners. It’s balance, he has no complaints so far.  _

_ He returns the nice guy’s wishes.  _

_ On his drive back he wonders if Scully knows and is planning something for tonight, he shopped for her list absent-mindedly but he remembers cranberries. Was that why she asked him for those? _

* * *

In the end, it wasn’t. She went to bed oddly early that night and he didn’t mention the date. He got distracted and the days flew by. 

A pull at his scalp makes him come back to the present, a slippery naked Scully stares up at him. 

She kisses his thoughts away. 

* * *

Pearlescent snow covers the woods and he can swear it talks to him. 

It says:  _ you can’t ignore Christmas, Fox.  _

It’s judging him. 

One snowflake at a time. 

_ Why are you always so clueless? Fox.  _

But snow doesn’t know him, she’s calling him by his first name. 

_ Scully cares about Christmas. She cared about Thanksgiving too.  _

He shakes his head. 

He wants to bring it up. How is communication the most important aspect of a relationship when they have never excelled at it? It’s a simple conversation about whether or not she cares about the holidays going by unnoticed. Except, they have the unspoken rule of not talking about anything related to the many heart aches they share. Instead, they focus on what’s for dinner and how much they’re allowed to show affection for each other. 

It’s a good strategy. It’s safe and they have mostly succeeded at it. 

A sudden silence invades the place, he can’t identify what’s different until he sits on the couch to try to read and notices that there’s no cracking sound coming from the fireplace. 

He goes to the porch to find more logs and is disappointed to find that they ran out of them. 

Scully stands in the doorway hugging herself, the wind is not aggressive but they were warm enough inside to feel the difference. 

“How did we not notice there wasn’t enough of that?”

He shrugs. “I can chop some wood.” 

She raises her eyebrows incredulously at him, “Mulder, that’s insane.” She stretches the last word like she’s talking to a child. “Let’s just turn up the heat.”

“Excuse me? I know how to chop wood. And Scully, if you think I’m sane I have some news for you-”

She walks over to the steps, “You’d have to shovel again. Your favorite sport!” 

He joins her to see for himself, the steps and the entryway, or the space where all that is supposed to be, is covered in several feet of snow. Again. 

She has a smug smile when he looks back at her. She never argues without proof. 

“So, I’ll shovel and then chop some wood and we’re lighting that fireplace.” Easy, he has no other plans for today.

“Be my guest.”

* * *

A growl startles her and she glances up from her book, she looks over the floor to ceiling wide window on the living room, he’s probably just putting on a show. She considers going back to reading but Mulder is hunched, his right hand tight on his upper left arm. She hesitates for a couple of seconds but figures he’s not exaggerating. 

When she opens the door, he calls her from his impractical chopping station. 

“I, um, I think I pulled my shoulder.” 

She runs down the steps to take a closer look. He hasn’t moved since she saw him through the window. As soon as she’s close to him, she’s in full Doctor Scully mode, she asks him to try move, rotate, anything that might indicate- 

“Ow!” 

A pulled shoulder it is, then. 

“Are you really laughing at me?” 

“Mulder, the heat was fine.”

She forces him inside, not without having to carry most of the chopped wood and giving up trying to convince him not to bring the rest himself. 

They make it all the way to the living room and drop the messy logs on the rug. Their arms were busy coming in so they still have their boots on and now the living room has their wet footprints and there probably will be wood splinters everywhere. 

She pushes back a strand of her long hair away from her face with the back of her hand and points at the couch with one very judgy index finger. 

“Sit.” 

“What about the fire?” 

“You are  _ injured. _ ” Her frustration is evident and she should try to be nicer because he’s hurt but years and years of this banter back her up. This could’ve been avoided. 

“Kiss it better?” Damn him. She was managing to stay mad. 

“You just need some ibuprofen, you’ll be fine.” She runs her fingers through his hair and returns his smile. 

Peacemaking. 

Which only lasts for a moment. She looks in the first aid kit and in every drawer after that, the cabin is an informal rental that they came across after they decided to give motels a break, they take cash and it’s cozy, the owners actually use it in the spring, it’s by the lake and their grandchildren probably love to play around it. They keep finding signs of life everywhere, extra folded quilts that look handmade in a linen closet that also has boxes full of God knows what, a perfectly equipped kitchen and - oh, yes, the medicine cabinet in the guest room. She hopes for the best.

Unfortunately, there’s no ibuprofen or any analgesic in sight.

* * *

“Your brilliant ideas are making me drive in this weather.” She puts his coat on for show, for comfort, or for convenience because it’s the one closest to her, but it’s a good sign that she doesn’t dislike him- 

“I hate you.” 

A good sign that her dislike is temporary, then. 

* * *

Not long has passed and Mulder is done counting the bricks on the fireplace. 

Thoughts of Christmas uninterruptedly hit him. 

He remembers her mischievous smirk when they playfully exchanged gifts that time in his apartment. She really had spent Christmas with him in a haunted house. They might not have upgraded their bond to a sexual relationship until later but they were together and each other’s long before that. 

A rush of affection for Scully invades him and he wants to make something that would make her happy. Something special. 

There’s nothing close for miles so that he could try and find anything at walking distance. He doesn’t even know what he’s looking for exactly. 

A goosebump distracts him, the absence of the fire making him uncomfortably cold. He gets up to throw his precious chopped chunks of wood into the fireplace. He lights it up. One-handed, of course.

Baking, he could try to bake something. Cook? 

The fridge stares back at him, full of food but nothing fun. 

After a thorough investigation of the kitchen, his most festive finding is a Swiss Miss box that has a few cocoa packets left in it. The best part is that they haven't expired. If only there were marshmallows or candy canes around. 

Another goosebump. He’s getting old. 

That’s it then: hot chocolate, and a warm fire. It’s Dickensian enough. He can make it happen, one of those puffy quilts he saw upstairs and the picture is complete.

He opens the linen closet, a red plaid quilt stands out from the rest, that’s the one he decides to pull out. 

The quilt sits on the top shelf. His shoulder reminds him he can’t reach up with both arms, so he has to force it down using only his right hand but when it slides forward, a large cardboard box almost falls on his face. It hits the ground and most of the contents are now scattered across the hallway of the second floor. 

Mulder swallows a curse, what he sees could pass as Santa’s workshop props. He looks inside the box properly to find enough Christmas lights to cover a villa and some carefully wrapped ornaments that survived the fall. The rest is old and rusty holiday decorations. A dusty but functional garland, four stockings that have the letters  _ M & B _ in home made crotched, and as he gets more curious and checks under the first shelf, there’s a radio but his last finding is the cherry on top: a box full of firewood. 

He has an hour to make everything work.

* * *

The living room is Christmas town, he can almost smell gingerbread if he tries hard. He found a station that only plays carols, snow piles up on the porch, and he doesn’t care because he doesn’t need to dream of a white Christmas, he has it right here and Scully’s on her way. 

What if he makes her upset, though? 

He looks around and tries turning off half of the lights. 

It looks incomplete. 

He tries to turn off all the lights now, the fireplace might be enough. 

It isn’t.

He leaves all the lights on and tries taking off the garland from above the fireplace, his shoulder keeps bothering him but he has more important problems right now. 

He steps back and walks to the front door and looks again from there. How does it look worse without the garland?

He puts it back and goes back to the entrance. Since he’s already there, he opens the door and squints his eyes to reach as far as he can, he wants to make sure she’s not near yet. But it’s like she reads his mind because he sees- could it be? The blurred mass of something slowly takes the shape of their truck, but she’s still not close enough to see him on the porch so he takes two steps outside and pretends to open the door, his socks are damp and rushes to takes them off before he catches a cold and Scully has to care after him for yet another stupid plan.

Speaking of stupid. 

It’s too late to take everything down. 

One last look outside and he realizes the curtains are open, both in the living room and the door. 

He quickly closes the one on the door and jumps over the couch to make his way to the ones in the living room, careful to avoid stepping barefoot on the rug. God forbid he adds splinters to the list of injuries. 

With his surprise intact, he takes a deep breath. 

The carols are too loud, she doesn’t like loud. It gives it all away. 

He realizes he’s still standing on by the living room window and the radio is all the way to the kitchen. He leaps on the couch and manages to turn the music off just in time to hear the soft roaring of the motor approaching. 

It takes less than a minute before he hears her park and her footsteps sound closer. 

He runs to the door for no reason other than he’s worried about her reaction and wants to see it up close. 

Her voice is loud as she turns the knob like she expects him to be on the couch where he left him nearly two hours ago. 

“Mulder! Did you know - “ she freezes on the spot as soon as she looks up. She clutches to the Walgreens bag like it holds her entire life. 

Her eyes water without warning and he cannot read her expression. 

She finally turns to him, her chin quivers with emotion and he’s suddenly forgetting his rehearsed apologies. 

“Oh, honey.” He reaches out to cup her face, her cheeks still cold from outside because she ventured out in the snow to help him and this is all his fault. “I’m so sorry.” He says to her lips. 

A single, fat tear wets his thumb at the same time she smiles wider than he’s seen in a while. 

“I was going to tell you that I found out that Christmas was yesterday.” She clears her voice, “I was feeling ridiculous because I saw candy canes and I- uh,” she glances down between them and he watches her fumble for something. “I bought some.” She says when she finds them.

“That’s exactly all we needed, Scully.” 

He mimics her grin and they both laugh at nothing in particular. He could question their ability to be so in tune when they are so different but they’re Mulder and Scully, he stopped questioning their nature years and years ago.

* * *

Christmas carols fill the cabin. It’s probably too much and she doesn’t even like them but it completes the picture and his heart is focused on the holiday spirit. 

He nonchalantly takes a candy cane for each of their mugs and throws them into the burning hot chocolate. Burning hot, the way she likes it. 

“That’s perfect.” She says like he’s the smartest man in the world and it makes everything worth it. Pulled shoulder included even though that was his doing. 

He hands her a mug and sits next to her on the couch, her legs on his lap, he pulls the quilt over them. 

The fire cracks. Her skin is glowing in the golden light. 

“Merry Christmas, I guess.” Her voice is his favorite sound. 

“Merry Christmas, Scully.” They cheer with chocolate stains on her lips and laugh trying to kiss it off each other. 

They say they love each other for the thousandth time and his head spins.

It makes him wonder if they will ever stop feeling like everything is still new between them. 

It’s not their first holiday together but this definitely is a time in their lives he both wants to erase and never forget. 

Not when she’s smiling widely at him and he sees how his whole life reflects on her eyes, up to this moment he could’ve sworn they couldn’t get any brighter. She proves him wrong and she’s not even trying. 

“How much does your shoulder hurt?”

“It’s fine if I don’t try to use it. Why?”

“No reason.” 

Her tongue tastes of Christmas cocoa and peppermint. And when she takes her sweater off he tries to pay extra attention, they’re crafting a memory and he doesn’t close his eyes for the rest of it.

  
  


* * *

They’re cuddled on the couch as the fire cracks like it’s their happy audience. Content as they are. Skin to skin. After the struggle of ridding Mulder of his sweater and undershirt, every minute of this day has been worth it. Including the mess on the rug, they’ll vacuum it tomorrow. Everything can wait.

They’re discussing this as the weight of the garland gives in and all the ornaments crash down with it. 

“There goes our deposit.” He mumbles against her hair. 

She laughs and turns around in his embrace. “It’s as if we’re bad at playing house.” 

“Bad? What’s missing?”

She hums in thought. “Well, first of all, this is not our house.” For a second he’s grateful his question didn’t stir anything that could drag them further into what they actually are and will always be missing. 

“Well then let’s get a house.” He says it like it’s easy and it could be done by snapping his fingers. 

“A house? Agent Mulder.” She teases him, it’s unlike them to talk about plans but she pushes her luck. 

“I don’t care where as long as I don’t have to shovel for four hours a day.” 

“We’re only here for one more week.” 

“That’s a lifetime of snow.” 

“Shut up, Mulder. I’m listening to Christmas carols.” 

He nods as he gently nudges his nose against hers. 

“But we’re on the run.” She murmurs, it’s barely audible, he’s not proud of how uncertain their fate is. He wants to assure her they’re going to be safe and together. 

“No, Scully,  _ I _ am on the run. You don’t have to hide forever, you can pretend you’re there on your own, worst comes to worst.” 

After a long pause, she turns around so he spoons her again. They don’t have to decide anything right now. 

“What do you think M and B stand for?” She asks. 

“Merry and Bright?” 

Her laughter echoes around the cabin.

  
  


* * *

The sheets are cold. But not for long, his warmth instantly makes her feel better. 

“How can I pay you back?” Her voice is raspy, a mix of lust and exhaustion. 

“By sleeping.” 

She wants to argue, he deserves pleasure in return and she’s always willing to show him in more ways than one how much she appreciates him. His hand feels nicely heavy against her cheek and he’s making it impossible to consider she could move ever again. His smile tells her he knows better, his thumb slides gently from her temple to her eyebrow, she takes a deep breath. 

Mulder is the exception to many of her rules, he makes her want to let herself be loved, and tonight, she’ll allow it. Along the shameless dream of a house that will be theirs, a life where they might keep a calendar, she’ll keep dictating their meals and watching him gulp down her abandoned cups of coffee. 

He’s the last image she sees before her eyelids finally give in. 

A Christmas miracle. 

A nice one but not their best one, except they don’t know that yet. 

That’s a story for another day.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for stopping by.  
> I'd love to hear what you think!  
> Happy holidays.


End file.
